turtledovefandomcom-20200216-history
Talk:Emperor of Mexico
What do you think? Turtle Fan 20:00, October 24, 2010 (UTC) :Looks good. TR 00:11, October 25, 2010 (UTC) Iturbide You've opened a bit of a can of worms here, TR. The path of the Hapsburg-Iturbide pretenders (that word again . . . ) to the Mexican emperorship is very unlike what we see here. :Indeed. It's certainly been one of those weird points in the series from the beginning. TR 16:22, January 29, 2011 (UTC) ::You know, a part of me thinks TL-191 is the goofiest thing ever. Turtle Fan 18:27, January 29, 2011 (UTC) For one thing, Max and Carlota were infertile. That's why they adopted the Iturbide kids, that and no doubt to tone down the flagrancy of their foreign interloper status. At the time of the adoption, Agustin's family became the House of Hapsburg-Iturbide, breaking off from the Iturbide dynasty proper (quite a high-falutin' word, that, "dynasty," considering that the family had no nobility whatsoever before usurping a hitherto nonexistent title, and that it had only actually been in power for ten months). The man you've submitted as a possible Maximilian II died childless. The pretender title then passed to his cousin's daughter--''daughter;'' notice we had no Empresses of Mexico in TL-191, unless they were consorts (though I don't think we had any of those, either). Then she died in the 1940s and today her grandson is the pretender, some old dude whom I believe is a Hungarian citizen. Though he doesn't bother pretending, anymore than any Iturbides or Hapsburg-Iturbides have since Max got shot. Now just because Agustin died childless doesn't mean he was infertile, and if he'd grown up as heir to the throne he surely would have married differently than he did in OTL, living in Washington as a private citizen and desperately trying to distance himself from the whole sordid affair. :He'd probably also marry much earlier in life. In OTL, he was only married for 10 years before he died, and the woman he married was about 43. Even with the advent of fertility treatments in out present day its hard, though not impossible, for a woman of that age to get pregnant. But the odds were certainly dwindling as the years passed. Agustin himself was bout 51 at the time of marriage, not the most sexually active years for a man, and if his health was declining all through the marriage, sex drive could certainly have gone with it. Also, Agustin, if wikipedia can be believed, spent a good chunk of his 30s convinced he was going to be murdered. Stress of that calibre does a male's fertility no favors. :So I guess we seem to be more or less saying: yeah, Max II could have been the historical Agustin, and here's how we'd retcon it. TR 16:22, January 29, 2011 (UTC) ::Sure. It's a higher priority to marry off a reigning monarch, or a person who is in prime position to become a reigning monarch, than it is an all-but-forgotten pretender to a decades-defunct throne, from a failed imperial adventure, by a ruler who got his ass spectacularly handed to him a few short years later, in a country that's such a mess you couldn't pay most people to take it. Turtle Fan 18:27, January 29, 2011 (UTC) We do have the minor problem that he died much, much later than the latest possible date for Maximilian II, though that can be hand-waved away. (Oh, and speaking of minor problems, he wasn't named Maximilian.) :Yeah, that would be an easy handwave. Mexico's OTL history is a solid series of revolutions. We know of one attempt to overthrow an emperor. It's not so hard to imagine another one claiming Max II's life directly (assassination) or indirectly (stress leads to poor health leads to early death). And the name issue: there's a comment in SA about how the Mexican Emperors like to take names that sound "Hapsburg". So that sort of implies name changes upon ascension. ::An abortive revolution in, say, 1890, when the US was still too weak to do anything more than root for the rebels from the sidelines. Yes, I can buy that. And perhaps it was put down with heavy Confederate support for the monarchists. That actually fits quite nicely as the first link in the mostly unseen chain of events that gradually shifted Mexico from the French sphere of influence to the Confederate. Especially when you remember that HT hates France: He could say the French couldn't be bothered to prop up their side and asked the Rebs to do it for them. Turtle Fan 18:27, January 29, 2011 (UTC) ::As for Mexican emperors taking Hapsburg-ish names, we've got a shitload of Maximilians (They couldn't even be bothered changing it to "Maximiliano") and two Francisco Joses, which hasn't sounded remotely Hapsburg since the War of the Spanish Succession. But, I don't object to the idea of their taking reign names. Turtle Fan 18:27, January 29, 2011 (UTC) ::::Three years later but: Francisco José is the Spanish form of Franz Josef. Who knows, maybe Mexico and Austria-Hungary never declared war on each other out of family connection. AFAIK the US and the Ottoman Empire never DOW'ed each other IOTL. Or maybe they did, even if they had good relations just before the war broke out (enough to name kids after uncles on the other branch of the family), see OTL House of Hohenzollern Romania joining the Entente, when literal weeks before they had been sharing war plans with Austria-Hungary.Eljuma (talk) 18:17, September 2, 2014 (UTC) :Oh, and Maximilian I's first name was actually "Ferdinand", so the trend of changing names is built in. TR 16:35, January 29, 2011 (UTC) ::Maximilian was part of his given name, just as George was part of George VI's. A shame he didn't try to rule Mexico as Ferdinand, that's a much better fit for a Spanish-speaking country. Turtle Fan 18:27, January 29, 2011 (UTC) Also there's the fact that as late as SA everyone is very clear that the Mexican emperors are Hapsburgs. Maybe that's because they don't want to say "Hapsburg-Iturbides;" I would get tired of saying that in a real hurry, and I dare say I have more Spanish than most TL-191 characters, save Hip and his brood. But from the way they're talking, the emperors are blood relatives of the Austro-Hungarian Hapsburgs. Maybe they found young Agustin a Hapsburg bride to cement the dynasty's claim to the throne, back before the alliance systems fell into place and set Mexico and the Dual Monarchy on opposite sides. Maybe someone in a position of influence decided to dispense with the Iturbides altogether and import some nephew or cousin or something of Max I to carry on the succession. :I'd buy it. TR 16:22, January 29, 2011 (UTC) ::I kind of like the first version better. Turtle Fan 18:27, January 29, 2011 (UTC) Or maybe HT just got lazy again: Recall that he got the date of Maximilian's accession all wrong when he had Lincoln talking to Lord Lyons in AF, and at any rate, after the Mexicans took Longstreet's money and handed over Sonora and Chihuahua they were pretty much done as a story element with any but the most remote, incidental relevance (if relevance can be remote and incidental at all). Turtle Fan 07:50, January 29, 2011 (UTC) :This could be as well. The ONLY reason we know of Max II is that HT says it was Max II in AF. His full name is never stated in HFR. This isn't wholly unusual for HT. He gives us full style and titles about as often as he doesn't, especially for reigning monarchs, e.g. Elizabeth II is just "Queen Elizabeth" for the handful of times she's mentioned in Colonization; in ItPoME we learn its Henry IX, but are left to guess at which Umberto it might be. :But it's within the realm of possibility HT just goofed. I don't think we can say it's an inconsistency--his subsequent revelation of Maximilian III plus his careful refusal to comment in HFR obscure the issue. TR 16:22, January 29, 2011 (UTC) ::No, no inconsistency, though I might like one. Turtle Fan 18:27, January 29, 2011 (UTC) :Another odd little point: in OTL Maximilian was 34 when he was executed in 1867. In 1881, he would have been turning 48. While it's quite possible he died of an infectious disease or whatever, that's still a noticeably young age. TR 16:35, January 29, 2011 (UTC) ::Yes. He's always struck me as quite the dumbass, so I could see him dying in a way that would today win him a Darwin Award. Turtle Fan 18:27, January 29, 2011 (UTC) Donutting the thread So I'm reading on the history of Mexico, and according to a chapter of the Oxford History Of Mexico, Maximilian and Carlotta weren't infertile. Max really enjoyed having sex with prostitutes, and Carlotta became so parnoid that he'd give her syphilis that they stopped sleeping together. And rather than give up his prosties, he named Agustin his heir. Doesn't change much our analysis from above, beyond offering the possibility that Max changed his ways and he and Carlotta produced an heir. But I thought it worth mentioning. TR 17:27, February 24, 2011 (UTC) These Guys and Franz Ferdinand From AF and other references we know beyond a doubt that in 1914 Franz Ferdinand was Crown Prince of the A-H Empire, as in OTL. Presumably he got there the same way he did in OTL: Franz Josef's only son died in 1889. At that point his younger brother, Karl Ludwig, became Crown Prince. But Karl Ludwig died in 1896, which bumped Franz Ferdinand up to first in line. Thing is, Karl Ludwig was the third son of Franz Karl, the emperor before Franz Josef. Franz Josef was the first son, and the second was our man Max. Franz Karl held Max's foolish intention to become a French cat's-paw at best in Mexico in such low regard that he disqualified Max from the line of succession. As Max died in 1867 this disqualification was something of a moot point: Franz Karl died in 1878 (would have died before Max in 191 if we stick with our belief that Max died right before HFR) and Franz Josef hung on all the way to 1916. However, the fact remains that, if Max had had a legally recognized son, whether by having a biological child with Charlotte or by making his adoption of Iturbide's grandson stick, that son would be closer to the Austrian throne than Karl Ludwig, Franz Ferdinand, or the Karl who eventually did succeed Franz Josef when the old guy finally kicked the bucket. Except of course that Franz Karl had disqualified Max, but that doesn't always stick. Some of the most influential monarchs in European history descended from ancestors who'd been disqualified by previous monarchs, but made good on claims to the throne through those ancestors just the same. Anyway, this doesn't really come into play till 1916, but in TL-191's Great War, the Entente would have had the opportunity to put forth one of their own (Francisco Jose I, most likely, whose German name is also Franz Josef, appropos of nothing) as the heir to a CP throne. I really don't see any dramatic potential there, not in the GWI as it was told in the story. HT might conceivably have butterflied Franz Josef into a slightly earlier death, and GWI might have grown out of the War of Austro-Hungarian Succession, but I don't find that a terribly interesting idea either (certainly nowhere near my interest in the prospect of GWI starting over Nicaragua, which was mentioned in AF as something that had almost happened). However, I didn't realize just how closely Max was related to the A-H emperors and could-have-been emperors whose misfortunes caused so much needless suffering a hundred years ago. (The approach of the WWI centennial is making me much gloomier than I'd expected it to.) Turtle Fan (talk) 20:30, March 24, 2014 (UTC) :Hi. This one has an easy IOTL solution, because Maximilian did renounce every right to the Austrian throne (the Austro-Hungarian compromise happened later), when he accepted the Mexican throne. Wether it was demanded by the Mexican legation, or Franz Josef himself, I don't remember, but it was in the interest of both. "Mexico" (meaning the Mexican conservatives) didn't want grounds to become a colony of Austria in the future, nor did the Austrian government want to become one of Mexico, would Franz Josef die with no heir. Eljuma (talk) 18:10, September 2, 2014 (UTC) :RE: War over a Nicaragua canal. Interestingly, America and Britain almost went to war over it, just before the civil war.Eljuma (talk) 18:22, September 2, 2014 (UTC) Literary Comment Blaise added a paragraph on an unrelated Heinlein novel. While we have those in other articles, they are story articles rather than in story specific articles. Now, we may want to keep this but I think it would need to have a separate sub-section since it has no relevance to the section its in now. Maybe "Emperor of Mexico in Other Works"? ML4E (talk) 18:15, February 6, 2016 (UTC) :If we keep it at all, then yes. Turtle Fan (talk) 21:10, February 6, 2016 (UTC) ::I don't think we should keep it for the following: 1) Lack of substance. The summary Blaise provided makes it clear that the role of the Mexican Empire (to say nothing of the Emperor) in the Heinlein novel is at best incidental to the plot; 2) Lack of relevance. I doubt anyone coming to the "Emperor of Mexico" page at the Harry Turtledove wiki will a shit that some other author(s) might have created their own line of Emperors of Mexico; 3)Improper formatting. As ML4E points out, such bits of trivia usually go on story pages. If we keep this, it should go on the main Southern Victory page in a trivia section--but I don't see this gaining anymore relevance if we do that; 4) Lack of parallelism in other offices. Note we haven't gone out of our way to list every fictional POTUS POTCS, PMUK, Monarch of the UK, etc. that have any Role in Any AH Ever written on those individual pages. Nor do I see any value in doing so. So I don't see any reason to create the "Emperor of Mexico in Other Works." TR (talk) 21:58, February 6, 2016 (UTC) :::I agree. I was in a bit of a rush with my last comment or I would have hit many of those same points. As it is, kindly supply a subtle emphasis to "If we keep it at all" in your minds' ears when reading it. :It does seem to have minimal value given all the possible stories out there with a Mexican Empire that lasted longer than OTL. As I recall Job, there isn't anything noteworthy about it. ML4E (talk) 21:41, February 7, 2016 (UTC) Is This Accurate? Since we'll be making an edit to this page anyway, I'd like to take the occasion to bring up a potential problem with the OTL section: "Mexico briefly reverted into a monarchy in the 1860s, during the Second Mexican Empire (1864–1867), ruled by Maximilian I." Juarez's government, which enjoyed the support of at worst a very sizable minority of the population even at its lowest points, did not believe itself to have reverted to empire (as opposed to, for instance, France's Second Republic, whose legislative body did give its blessing to Nap III's assumption of the imperial title, albeit under duress). And the Second Mexican Empire enjoyed only limited diplomatic recognition; the US, for instance, was so insistent on its illegitimacy that Seward ordered the staff of our consulate in Veracruz to shut down operations the night before Max and Charlotte landed in that city, lest the presence of US officials in proximity to their procession be taken as tacit acceptance of the new order. This would all be a moot point if some later Mexican government at some has point said "Oh, sure, call it a legitimate government for the couple years it held the capital, why not." Has any government done so? I don't know either way, but given the glowing light in which subsequent generations of Mexicans hold the juaristas in popular memory (they've even turned the anniversary of a fairly inconsequential, to say nothing of temporary, battlefield victory into their national holiday) I'd be surprised to learn they had. If not, then we should rewrite the intro of the article to make it clear that there's only been one official Mexican emperor as well as one pretender. Turtle Fan (talk) 04:06, February 7, 2016 (UTC) :In reviewing the history, the Mexican Congress of the did proclaim the country an Empire via referendum in 1863. And as you pointed out, while Juarez had a minority of support at first, it was nonetheless a minority. While Juarez did become popular after he returned to power and ousted the foreign monarch, prior to his overthrow, Juarez presided over a very unstable period in the country's history, so even the most lukewarm conservative was basically ok with Maximilian in the early stages as they hoped an empire would stabilize things. So, within the country's borders, enough of the population was satisfied with the empire at first that it is appropriate to call it a legitimate government. TR (talk) 04:42, February 7, 2016 (UTC) ::The Plan of Tacubaya is the lynchpin here. If we accept it, then Juarez was an outlaw. If we reject it, the Congress in question was illegitimate. Its constitutionality is . . . a bit of a gray area. ::My understanding of the motivations of the leading conservatives (essentially warlords) was that they wanted large foreign armies to crush the juaristas for them, then leave. They'd swear allegiance to the cat's-paw emperor and make nice till the Europeans were gone, then the knives would come out. The original plan for the intervention was that it would be a combined French, British, and Spanish venture, with the further involvement of Austrian and Belgian royalty lending the whole thing a pan-European feel. But Palmerston's key allies had offered only lukewarm support from the beginning, and once the Emancipation Proclamation pushed the Cabinet to a pro-US orientation generally, Britain withdrew. Meanwhile, Madrid was going all-in on the Dominican Republic instead, so Nap III had to act unilaterally. That made it harder for the anti-Juarez warlords to have it their way, as Paris would now feel it had the right to semi-colonize Mexico for the long term. But better a foreigner who would never enjoy much popular support than the hated Juarez, who was by now well on his way to becoming something of a folk hero. ::Their motivations are of course irrelevant from a legal perspective. If they controlled the real Congress and rammed through this proclamation, however insincerely, the Second Empire is legit. Was the Congress they controlled the real one? When Silver announced his contest ten years ago, I never would have imagined I was about to place myself in the position of having to decide the constitutional validity of Tacubaya. ::Either way, I think a note indicating that the Second Empire had limited diplomatic recognition is in order. I'm poking around on Google and have found references to only three countries that opened embassies at Max's court: France (of course), Spain, and Belgium (whose king was Max's father-in-law). Turtle Fan (talk) 06:41, February 7, 2016 (UTC) TCotTSD "In The Case of the Toxic Spell Dump, Aztecia (Mexico) is ruled by a succession of Emperors throughout the 20th century. However, as the novel's Point of Divergence is deliberately vague, it is unclear whether this monarchy has any connection to the Mexican Empires of OTL." This isn't the Emperor of Mexico, this is the Emperor of Aztecia. Please see Talk:Führer of the Greater German Reich for the concerns we have including rough analogs in the title pages. TR (talk) 15:28, February 12, 2018 (UTC) :I agree. Quit adding fantasy analogs to historical rulers. ML4E (talk) 21:31, February 12, 2018 (UTC)